IT has taken three years of hard work, but the Citizen's dancing girl has finally come to the end of her studies in London.

Talented Belinda Blight has rewarded the anonymous benefactor who paid her course fees of £21,000 by completing a degree at the prestigious Laban Centre for Movement and Dance.

The 20-year-old now intends to move into choreography but faces a nail-biting few weeks before receiving her results.

"I am confident of passing," she said. "It is not important what grades I get, I just know that I have done the best I can."

Belinda, of Kelsons Avenue, Thornton, made an appeal through the Citizen three years ago after being turned down for a Lancashire County Council grant despite being accepted into one of the top dance schools in the country.

Luckily, a reader dubbed Champagne Charlie offered to pay her course fees and she is now passing on a message of thanks to him.

"It's wonderful what he did and I couldn't have got where I am today without his help," she said.

"The course was hard work but definitely worth it. It made me grow up a lot - now I know exactly what I want to do and have the confidence to go out and do it."

A typical day at the Laban centre for Belinda involved studying ballet and contemporary dance, technical classes, choreography and completing various projects including making a video and staging a graduation show.

She is now staying in London and working full-time in a shoe shop in Covent Garden until she is able to get her choreography career of the ground, maybe by taking part in festivals.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.